Then I realized why no one in the room had moved a muscle except for Hatter and Tokki. No one could. Tokki had used compulsion when he'd told us all to stop. We had no choice but to obey him. My breathing slowed. He snapped his fingers in front of my face. "You may move."
I blinked, and my tense shoulders slumped. I peered around the room at the vampires which had all been frozen into place. "How long will they stay like that?"
Tokki shrugged and frowned at me while climbing from the chair. "No matter. Get down here, young lady."
My stomach twisted at his rebuke. But he was right. I let out a long breath and deflated, letting my body fold back in on itself and return to normal size again. "I'm sorry, Mr. Tokki."
"What are you doing here?"
I proceeded to confess to Tokki all that had happened that night, starting with when I'd first seen him in the courtyard of the school and ending with my near-execution. Tokki's eyes grew wider with each event I told him, and his frown deepened. When I was finished he shook his head. "This is outrageous. No matter. The guardians are on their way."
He stepped away from me and closer to the three elders whose faces were frozen in a look of disdain. But they seemed able to move their eyeballs, which was more than I had been able to do. Tokki's hands were on his hips. I knew from experience with him in class that meant a lecture was coming. "When the Guardians get here, I'm certain they will be as shocked as I am. That the elders of the Heart Coven would condone a murderer who broke the treaty in their midst was one thing. I could believe they were just turning a blind eye. But this is more than just turning a blind eye. You were going to be a willful part of murdering a slayer—one who is just a child of sixteen, no less!"
I swallowed and watched as they all seemed frozen. Then a long squeal come out of Regina's lips. She seemed as unable to move as the rest of them, but somehow she'd gotten the ability to use her diaphragm. Surprising.
Forcing the deep magic of compulsion in his voice again, Tokki turned toward the vampire woman in red. "Silence. Be still. I will not hear another sound out of you."
I blinked as Regina's whimpering stopped. Who knew Tokki had this much power? He'd never used it in the classroom before. It would have likely made teaching a lot easier, I'd think, to command the students to learn.
Tokki's back was turned toward the elders as he concentrated on Regina. And I swore I saw one of their faces twitch. Then one of them leaned back. Before I could say another word, the female phased toward Tokki and slammed her hand against the back of his neck, knocking him unconscious. Hatter and Chester both scrambled to him and pulled him from under the elder's hard glare. "We have been oppressed by the guardians for long enough. The time of the one-sided treaty is ended. We will listen to no one but our queen."
The woman snapped her fingers in front of Regina's face.
And Regina began to laugh, her face contorting further than I'd seen so far. She picked her ax up from the ground and rested it upon her shoulder. "Let the guardians come. Let them come and meet their fate. For tonight we will not only spill the blood of the first slayer we've seen in twenty years, but the blood of the guardians will drench my hands as well."
Then she turned and looked toward me, her ax at the ready. The other two elders who'd had yet to move phased toward me and grabbed me by the arms. I was trapped again, and this time, Tokki's compulsion wasn't going to save me.
Chapter 10
I peered toward Hatter and Chester, who had Tokki propped up between them. I hoped he was okay. Then Chester looked at me again and nodded. I needed to grow. No one was going to save me. I needed to save myself. Concentrating, I thought big thoughts and unfolded myself. The elders gripped my arms with vice-like hands. But bigger also meant stronger, and I was already strong for a five feet, six inch girl because of my slayer genes. Once I became eight feet tall, I felt nearly invincible. I lifted both elders off the ground with the strength of an arm curl, as I'd seen fathers do with toddler children. Then I swung them toward each other so that their bodies slammed together and they were forced to release their grip.
The ax slammed down upon the chair I stood next to, breaking it into splinters of wood. I blinked down. Two of the pieces formed perfectly into wooden stakes just like those I'd been trained to battle with. I slipped down and grabbed them both and then crouched in a fighting stance with my back to the wall. Three elders, four knaves, Jack Kingston, and Regina with an ax—all of them faced me down. Beyond them, I could see Hatter and Chester trying to inch their way to the door, dragging Tokki between them. But when they got to the door and opened it, four more knaves stood there, each armed with a small hatchet.
It seemed that vampires liked their axes. Who knew?
The three elders phased toward me. But this time I was ready and could see their movements, as the adrenaline pumped hard through my veins. I drew in a breath and threw one of my stakes so that it landed squarely in the elder with the raspy voice's chest. His eyes went wide for a split second before he vanished in a cloud of dust. The stake that I'd thrown fell to the ground with a hollow sound. The other two elders froze only three feet away from me and hissed in my direction. Their faces finally showed their true natures.
Outside in the hallway, shouts came, and some of the knaves who'd blocked the way headed back down the hall. I breathed a small breath of relief. The guardians were coming. It had to be them, right?
Regina slammed her ax down toward me, and I jumped out of the way just in time. Unfortunately, it was away from the chair where I might be able to grab more stake-like weapons, and it was closer to the corner. I frowned, holding my stake in front of me.
"Not very good odds of survival for you. There are many of us, and you have only one stake left," Regina said, swinging her ax up again and setting it on her shoulder.
A smile tugged at the side of my lips. "Wonder if I could even those odds if I stake your heart and take that ax from you?"
Her eyes went wide and a maddening look slipped over her face. "Slayers are humans. You bleed just as much as anyone else, and I can't wait to taste your blood."
Then she leapt toward me. I made my first priority controlling the direction of her ax. I blocked it away from me, jumped away from the blade and kept it from slicing me wide open.
One the knaves came toward me, flipping his hatchet for better grip. Regina pushed an arm out to the side. "No. Leave this one to me. I will win this battle and prove I am worthy to be queen."
I laughed. "Now she stops cheating. Amazing."
But in reality, my heart thundered harder against my chest. She cheated at billiards because she knew she wasn't very good. To not cheat now had to mean that she was confident in her abilities. She obviously felt that she didn't need to cheat to win. It was up to me to prove her wrong. Her metal clashed against my wood, but the blade never struck my skin. We wrestled and shoved and kicked each other, bringing our weapons into the dance as often as we could, but failing at each attempt to find purchase. Out of the corner of my eyes, I found that the knaves were busy battling with others. Flashes of blond hair captured the light, but I couldn’t look long enough to recognize who those guardians were.
My muscles ached and screamed. Each moment we remained in battle, I grew weaker and my movements slowed. At least it seemed the same for the vampire queen. She also slowed with me. Then I finally saw it, the opening I'd been waiting for. But in order to take out the queen, I'd need to sacrifice a pawn. It was enough to make me decide. I jumped forward and slammed the stake into Regina's chest. Her ax found purchase in my shoulder. My collarbone snapped as the blade dug into my flesh.
Her eyes went wide for a split second before she shriveled slowly and disappeared in a cloud of dust. My hand kept a grip on the stake as I fell to the ground, blackness crowding the sides of my vision. Then Chester's face filled my view. "You're losing quite a lot of blood."
I blinked up at him, my body slowly turning cold. "No kidding."
He smiled down. "Just relax, we
'll take care of this," he said and then called toward some people to the side.
But the black dots overcame my sight, and I succumbed to the darkness again.
When I woke, my heart panicked as I remembered what had happened. The room I sat up in was nearly as dark as what had been behind my eyes, but I was raised up and in a softish bed. I blinked and tried to lean on my arm to get up, but pain sliced through my body from my shoulder. A squeal and whimper escaped my lips, and I fell back into the bed, holding my shoulder. Slowly the pain subsided, and I looked around again at the room. Bright light peered in through the crack under the door and as my eyes adjusted to the darkness, I realized I was in a hospital room of sorts.
"Hello?" I called out when I saw the shadow of feet shuffle past the door.
The shadows stopped and voices spoke outside. Then the door opened and people entered in. The light behind them kept their faces in shadow. One stepped to the side and flicked on the light in the bathroom. The light kept things from becoming too bright in the room and hurting my eyes, but finally shone on the faces of the people who'd entered.
"Mom? Dad?" I blinked and rubbed at my eyes. Was I seeing this correctly? Did I have a concussion? There was no way that I was seeing my parents standing in this hospital room right now, was there?
My mother leaned forward and flicked on the light on the bedside table. Soft light filled the room, and I blinked at it again, trying to adjust my sight quickly. "Yes, Alice. It's us."
Tears stung the back of my eyes, but it wasn't sadness or excitement. It wasn't that I was touched by their presence. No. I narrowed my eyes at her. I was pissed, and it showed in the hard tone of my voice. "What are you doing here?"
She offered me a sheepish smile. At least she had the decency to be a bit embarrassed. "We heard about the trouble you'd gotten yourself into."
As if this was the first time I'd gotten into trouble at Wonderland Guardian Academy. I rolled my eyes. "So."
"So, we came to help."
"Great," I said, turning my face from her. "You helped. Now I suppose that you all can just disappear from my life again. I'll see you again in five or six years, maybe."
My chest ached, and hot tears spilled over my cheeks. I didn't want to talk like this, but their presence brought up every feeling of abandonment I'd ever had. It was unfair that they came now. Part of me just wanted them to go away again so I could stop feeling things for them. I hated them for making me feel anything. It was easier when they weren't around and I could forget them.
My mother sighed. "I can understand that you're mad at us, but you don't understand what we've been going through."
I whipped my head back toward her and frowned. "What have you been going through, mother? What made you abandon your only child and not speak to her or send her an email or text message, or something for over five years?"
She swallowed hard and swiped tears from her own eyes. "We deserve your anger. I wanted to let you know where we were the whole the time. I wanted to speak to you for every holiday or on your birthday every time the date came on my calendar but we couldn't."
I swallowed the lump that had formed in my throat. "And why was that?"
My father cleared his throat and finally spoke, "Because if we'd contacted you, it would have killed you."
Chapter 11
I scrunched my brows at him and tried to adjust the way I was lying on the bed so I could give them my full attention. Sharp pain seized my shoulder, but at least this time it only flashed through my body in a moment, like an electric jolt and then subsided. "What do you mean?"
My father nodded, his arms crossed over his chest, his face contorted with anger. "The Heart Coven isn't the only one that had broken the covenant. Several vampire covens up and down the East Coast have broken the treaty. We've been hunting for definitive proof for nearly ten years. It was only when we got close enough to the Spade clan that we cut off contact with you."
"We had to pretend you didn't exist," my mother said, trying to pull my hand into hers.
They were warm, while my hand was cold, but I didn't need the distraction. I pulled my hand away from hers. "Explain."
My father pulled a chair closer to the bed and sat in it beside my mother's. "The Spade Coven of vampires is known for wiping out full families of their victims. They were the most brutal clan before the treaty. We suspected that they'd started again as there was a rash of home invasions in the New Jersey area where all of the family members were brutally killed. But the invaders used guns. The only thing that made the FBI suspicious enough to call in the guardians was the lack of blood. The crime scenes weren't spotless, but the amount of blood never measured up to the amount of damage done to the victims."
"So, you're saying that you felt the Spade clan would come after me?"
My mother nodded. "Yes, if we were discovered as the slayers who were hunting them, they would try to find out if we had any family. We couldn't keep in contact with you because it would potentially mean we'd lose you."
I frowned. "The Heart clan was breaking the treaty, too?"
My father nodded. "All four vampire clans on the East Coast were breaking the treaty. Each coven had their own weapon of choice. Spades used guns, Clubs used… well… clubs."
"The Diamond coven used knives, and the Heart clan, axes," my mother said as she wrung her hands in her lap. "They each were using human weapons to commit atrocities so that they wouldn't be found out and they could continue pretending that the treaty was still intact. They waited until the opportunity would come that a slayer would break the treaty so they could say that the blood was on the hands of the guardians instead of themselves. They needed to find a slayer who they could pin blame upon."
Goosebumps rose on my arms. "And I fell into their lap today."
My mother nodded.
"Were you in New Jersey, then?"
My father shook his head. "No. We've been in Virginia for the last three days because the guardians intended to question Regina, Queen of the Heart Coven on Monday. We were hoping to catch a glimpse of you during our time here…"
"And I was hoping to be able to give you this," my mother said, pulling a small package out of her jacket pocket and handing it to me. "Happy Birthday, Alice."
I frowned, but accepted the box from her hands. "What is it?"
"Open it."
I fumbled with the red ribbon around the white box, since my right hand still felt a bit cold and numb from the blood loss of my shoulder injury. It didn't quite want to work the way I commanded it to. After a few minutes of struggle, I opened the box. Within it was a locket. The locket brought back memories of myself as a child. "You used to wear this locket all the time when I was little," I said, looking up into my mother's eyes.
She nodded. "I did. I got it from my mother, and I kept a picture of her and you inside it."
I opened the locket, and there was a picture of my mother and father on one side, while the other side remained empty.
"I hope that you'll fill that spot someday with a picture of your own child. I haven't been able to wear that locket in over five years. I hope that you can now wear it proudly."
I closed my fist around the cold metal locket. "Thank you. But does that mean that you're leaving me again? Do you need to return to hunting or spying or whatever with the Spade Coven?
She shook her head. "The treaty has been broken. Your wounds show that the Heart Clan broke the treaty and there’s more evidence that they caused the deaths that happened around Crystal City all the way up to the DC Beltway. The Heart Coven was caught red-handed."
I blinked up at her. "Does that mean they've confessed?"
"Jack Kingston, the new head of the Heart Coven has apologized for his clan's participation in the breaking of the treaty. He wants to ratify a new treaty with the guardians. I believe he will be a benevolent leader. We are hoping his example will help the other covens see reason."
"And if they don't?"
My father frowned. "Then your m
other and I will return to our job, this time as true slayers instead of just hunting down information."
"Until today, it had been nearly twenty years since either of us have slayed a vampire. But it seems that you slayed two, yourself, as well." My mother beamed.
"I guess so." It wasn't what I'd set out to do. Both Regina and the Elder I slayed had attacked me, and I'd just let my instincts guide my hand to protect myself. My training had kicked in and I'd responded. "So, what now?"
My mother took my hand again in both of hers, and this time, I let her. She patted the top of it. "We won't be out of touch again. Although we're going back to work, we will be there for you for holidays, your birthday, whatever. You'll have our cell numbers and can call us anytime you need us. We're sorry you've had to do this alone for so long."
Tears stung the backs of my eyes again. I wasn't abandoned the way that I'd thought I'd been. They did love me and care about me. The lump in my throat completely made it so I was unable to speak, so I just nodded.
My father's face softened. "We truly are sorry that you've had to go through all this time without word from us. It wasn't right. And we plan to do what we can to make up for it. You're in the hospital for the next few days. Then you go back to school, but you don't have to live at the dorm anymore if you don't want to. Your mother and I have bought a townhouse in the city. You can come live with us, if you'd like to."
I swiped my eyes as the tears welled up in them. I managed to get one word past the lump in my throat. "Really?"
My mother nodded. "Yes. You can also choose to stay in the dorm during the school week and then come home on the weekends, when we're not working either. It’s been a long time since your father made you pancakes, and he wants to set a standard date of doing them for you every Sunday morning."
Alice the Vampire Slayer Page 5
